


A Halo in Reverse

by rosewiththorns



Category: Hockey RPF
Genre: Caring, Detroit Red Wings, Discipline, Gen, Guilt, Guilt Spanking, M/M, Non-Sexual Submission, Pride, Promises, Spanking, mentoring
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-10
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-05 23:01:11
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,005
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5393477
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/rosewiththorns/pseuds/rosewiththorns
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Hank is feeling guilty and needs Steve to help him find atonement.</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Halo in Reverse

**Author's Note:**

> This was written with slight modifications per reader request and is something of a companion piece to my earlier work entitled "The Sun's Rays Do Not Burn (until Brought to a Focus)" but it's designed to be enjoyed individually on its own merits. However, readers interested in extra background should definitely consider checking out that story as well.

“You wear guilt like shackles on your feet, like a halo in reverse.”—Depeche Mode 

A Halo in Reverse

Detroit had lost in overtime—the worst way to lose even if you did get a consolation, participation point in the standings—and it was all his fault, Hank thought, burying his head still deeper into his tear-damp pillow, and hoping to hide from the world forever behind it. Sure, he knew that hockey was a team sport, but it had been he who had beaten the goalie but not the damn post, and then had been forced to watch, only seconds later from the bench after a shift change, as the opposition scored, bringing sudden, heart-stopping, death as swiftly as a descending guillotine. 

The worst part was that after the sudden death, the guilt hadn’t subsided, but had swelled like a bruise until it was large enough to swallow him, because he hadn’t scored since he had been squeezing his stick too tight. He had been too eager—maybe even too desperate—to win the game for his injured captain, and he’d ended up losing it instead. If he looked up irony in the dictionary, this situation would probably be the definition, but he was too bone-tired to move. 

He had believed that the pillow flung over his face muffled the sound of his sobbing, but when a firm fist knocked on the door, he figured that he probably sounded like a bellowing buffalo giving birth over a public address system. 

“Hank!” At Steve’s voice, Hank flinched further into his pillow, because Steve was probably the person in the world that he could least bear to look at right now. Steve would be a reminder of his overtime failure staring him in the face. “May I come in?” 

“If you want,” mumbled Hank, not lifting his face from his pillow, since if Steve could hear his wails, he could hear his words. 

As the door swung open and closed, Hank remained concealed behind his pillow, but when the mattress sagged as Steve sat down beside him, he couldn’t prevent his gaze from flicking up. 

“You aren’t to blame, kid.” Steve slipped an arm around his shoulders, and Hank might have twisted away from this soothing touch—because he didn’t deserve to be comforted after he had messed up so terribly—if he hadn’t been weary from head to toe. 

“Then why do I feel like I am?” Hank mopped at his eyes to make it less obvious than a blaring neon sign that he had been weeping. 

“Because you’re too hard on yourself sometimes.” Steve’s hand squeezed his shoulder. “Of anyone, you had the best shot of winning the game for us in overtime.” 

“Exactly, Stevie.” Hank bit his lip. “I blew it. I shot wide. The puck could’ve gone into the net—I had the goalie beat—but I fired wide. It was all my fault we lost.”

“Any shot fired can go in, Z.” Steve’s hand was massaging his neck. “You can’t blame yourself for every missed shot, because even Brett Hull has a lot more shots than he has goals.” 

“You’re only saying that because you think it will make me feel better.” Hank wanted to smile, but it emerged as a snort. 

“Is it working?” Steve arched an eyebrow. 

“No, Captain.” Hank shook his head. 

“What can I do to make you feel better then, Hank?” Steve’s question was almost a sigh.

Opening his mouth, he was about to reply that Steve could do nothing to assuage his guilt, but his lips snapped shut when he recalled the one time Steve had spanked him. It had hurt more and humbled him more than any other punishment he had ever received, wrenching tears from the deepest core of his being. It had been pure, purging pain that stripped away his pride but also his guilt along with his clothing. After a spanking it would be impossible for him to feel that he hadn’t been thoroughly punished for his overtime blunder, and once the spanking was finished, he could accept Steve’s comfort and feel truly forgiven. 

“Come on,” urged Steve, cupping Hank’s chin between his palms. “Talk to me, kid.” 

“Do you remember that time you spanked me?” Hank toyed with his pillow. 

“Yes.” Steve’s forehead knotted. “I’m not going to spank you now, if that’s what you’re worried about.” 

Not ready to admit that it was the opposite—Steve not spanking him when he needed it—that had him concerned, Hank asked, “Why not, Captain?” 

“Three reasons, each one better than the next.” Steve brushed a stray lock of hair away from Hank’s temple. “First of all, you don’t need me to punish you when you are doing that to yourself far more harshly than I would. Second of all, you made a mistake, and I don’t believe in punishing people for mistakes, just for things they deliberately do wrong. Third of all, I promised you I wouldn’t spank you again, and I keep my word no matter how difficult it is.” 

“I need to be spanked.” Hank took a breath that rattled his lungs as he made this confession. “I’m asking to be spanked, so it’s different from last time.” 

“You were asking to be spanked last time, too.” His lips quirking, Steve patted Hank’s cheek. “It’s just that then it was your actions, not your words, doing the asking, and your actions were much more worthy of a spanking then than your words are worthy of a spanking now.” 

“I need to be spanked, Stevie, or else I won’t be able to forgive myself for what happened in overtime.” Perhaps it was the plea in Hank’s tone that kept Steve silent enough for him to add, trying to sound less shaky than he felt—since begging for a spanking was the most awkward position he had ever been in—“When you spanked me, I know you did it because you thought I needed it. Now please do it because I think I need it.” 

“All right,” Steve assented, pressing his mouth into a grim line after a moment’s hesitation in which Hank couldn’t breathe. “I’m doing this against my better judgement and we’re probably both going to regret this, but I’ll do it.” 

Hank intended to say a thank-you, but his mouth was too dry to choke out the words. 

“Over my knee, Hank.” Steve tapped his lap. “Let’s get this over with.” 

Butterflies began to fly in Hank’s stomach as he bent over Steve’s knee, and, as he felt Steve’s right hand unzip and lower his jeans while his left palm pushed between his shoulder blades to prevent him from squirming away from the spanking, the butterflies fluttered into his throat. Yet, when he didn’t feel Steve’s fingers wrap around the elastic band of his boxers to tug them down to his knees, he said in a strangled voice, “On the bare please, Captain.” 

He knew he probably sounded like a masochist, but a spanking on his bare butt would bring him more pain and make him feel more vulnerable, quickening the expiation of his guilt, or so he hoped. Besides, although he would never admit it aloud, Steve’s strong hand on his skin was somehow comforting even when it was blistering his backside. 

Steve paused, and then, Hank’s flesh tingled as Steve’s fingers hooked in his boxers and pulled them down to circle Hank’s knees just above his jeans. Hank’s exposed rump felt cool for a second before a fire was lit in it as Steve’s palm struck the center of his buttocks with enough force to draw a gasp from Hank. Obviously, now that Steve had been convinced to give the spanking, he was determined to administer it properly; with Steve, there were no such thing as half-measures. 

“What—“ Steve accompanied each word with a hard swat that brought tears welling to blur Hank’s vision—“are you being spanked for, Z?” 

“Missing the goal.” It was a struggle to speak with Steve’s hand beating a tattoo against his rear. “Letting the team down.” 

“Wrong.” Steve followed this stern pronouncement with the strongest smack yet, and the tears that had swam into Hank’s eyes started to stream down his cheeks in rivulets. “Try again.” 

“Because I asked you to spank me, Stevie.” Fumbling around for something to cling to as waves of wails ripped through his body, Hank clutched onto Steve’s knee. 

“Correct but not particularly insightful.” Steve’s palm provided a stinging critique of Hank’s vague response. “Why did you ask me to spank you, kid?” 

“Because I felt guilty.” Hank’s face felt as hot as his behind, and sobs made his speech shaky. 

“Why did you feel guilty?” Steve prodded, raining unrelenting spanks on Hank’s upturned, naked bottom. 

“I let the team down.” Hank couldn’t prevent an edge of impatience from creeping into his voice, because, after all, they had discussed this at the outset of the spanking. “I didn’t score when I had the goalie beat in overtime.” 

“You shouldn’t feel guilty.” Steve’s tone was as uncompromising as his hand. “It’s not like you deliberately hit the post, and you did your best and worked hard. When you do your best and work hard, you can’t feel guilty for how things turn out, Z, because you couldn’t have done anything to change the outcome. Reserve your guilt for the times when you don’t work hard enough or don’t give your best effort at something. Understand?” 

Hank was sobbing so hard he couldn’t speak, so he nodded meekly. He thought this gesture of submission combined with the fact that Steve’s lecture seemed to have been winding to a conclusion would mark the end of the spanking, but instead Steve increased both the frequency and the strength of his blows. Hank’s sobs turned into howls yanked from his aching lungs that scratched his throat—raw from crying as he never had in his life—and sliced into his ears, which could have confused the anguished noises with those wrenched from a werewolf at full moon. Finally, when his tear ducts had finally run dry and his lungs were out of air to scream with, he stopped crying, as a peculiar stillness—not peace, exactly, but at least the relief of crushing guilt being removed from his heart—folded over him like a woolen blanket. 

As Hank fell silent at last, he noticed as if from a mile’s distance, that Steve was no longer spanking him. One of Steve’s hands rubbed figure-eights into his back, while the other lifted Hank’s jeans and boxers to their original locations. 

“You don’t feel guilty any more, do you?” Steve’s words were as gentle as his hands as he guided Hank into an upright position and wrapped him against his chest in an embrace that made Hank feel warm to his toes as he did when he sipped a steaming mug of hot cocoa. 

“Nope.” Hank’s lips quivered into a grin. “I don’t feel anything except my ass.” 

“You’ll be feeling your ass for awhile.” Steve offered one of his trademark wry smile as he stroked the shell of Hank’s ear, tickling the delicate skin. “If I might make a bold prediction, you’ll probably be sleeping on your side tonight.” 

“At least I’ll be sleeping and not kept awake by guilt.” Hank glanced up at Steve, hoping his mentor to read the gratitude in his wet gaze. “You weren’t mad at me for feeling guilty were you, Stevie?” 

“Of course not, Hank.” Steve combed the hair away from Hank’s forehead and brushed his lips against the revealed flesh in his ultimate gesture of approval and affection that made Hank shiver with pleasure and pride. “I’m proud of you. Your attitude will last your whole career, and a win would have only lasted for tonight. That mindset you have where losing is unacceptable to you will do the Red Wings a lot more good in the future than winning the game tonight would have.”


End file.
